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””Wh White e Ciity, , Bl
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WHITE CITY/ BLACK CITY
‘ As the title of the book, written by Sharon Rotbard.
WHITE CITY
BLACK CITY
In 2003, Tel Aviv was designated a World Heritage Site. It is internationally known as the “White City”, mainly bacause of its high concentration of Bauhaus architecture.
This illustration is made as a recogition to the implicit history of Tel Aviv. It also a conceptual illustration of the “Tel”; mount, in which one civilization lies in a layer underneath the other.
My project has taken inspiration from this
phenomena.
WHITE CITY
BLACK CITY
WHITE CITY/ BLACK CITY Name: Elenita Mikaela Borg Studio affiliation: Studio 4
Supervisors: Ori Merom, Charlie Gullström Hughes.
‘ As the book with the same title, written by Sharon Rotbard.
INTRODUCTION
In january 2013, I followed my studio to Israel. This project is a collection of what I experienced on our journey through the country, and the thoughts it evoked. It is also a collection of symbols and metaphors found in the areas we visited.
Tel Aviv is widely known as the “White City”. According to the myth, it rose out of the dunes of sand as a new Hebrew city. However, deeper investigation reveals that a part of the municipality is established on the post-Nakba ruins of the former village Manshiya. This village was almost totally erased, partly for political reasons.
The project is an exploration into the story of erasure, and an attempt to evoke the traces of what once was there. I have proposed an underground structure hidden in sand.
The objective is not to present a final answer, but to contribute to an ongoing discussion of who is the winner or loser in the writing of history, and what role architecture has in this battle.
PROJECT
The research, in the case of Tel Aviv in particular, but also in a broader perspective, has been the largest part of my project.
The process is divided into a number of methodical steps:
1. Pronouncing statement of intent
My intention has been to investigate the role that architecture has had in times of warfare and contesting spaces. Both as a tool for influencing the writing history, and a as testimony. How does the decision to erase, renovate or reuse affect the historical narrative?
In what way is the ruin important? Do we need a physical symbol to represent an historical action? These questions have been studied mainly through the example of Manshiya and Tel Aviv.
2. Method
2.1 Research. The process started with the research on Tel Aviv and Manshiya, but also a study of other examples, such as Warsaw. A lot of literature has been included in these studies. Two examples are the books “White City, Black city”, by Sharon Rotbard, and “Overthrowing geography”, by Marc LeVine. I have studied lectures and video
documentation on the subject. I also made a schematic reconstruction of Manshiya by tracing old maps.
2.2 Evaluation of the need for a physical representation in the case of Manshiya and Tel Aviv.
My conclusion was that a physical symbol was important for these stated reasons:
When talking to people in Tel Aviv, or on my trip to Israel as a whole, I found that the story of Manshiya is relatively unknown. There is no trace of the history of Manshiya in the city plan. Those who had knowledge seemed un-willing to discuss it. It was clear that it to some extent was denied and hidden. The lack of a physical representation might contribute into making this denial possible.
In 2007, artist Ronen Eidelman traced the old streets of Manshiya in the now empty lawns by the seafront. He called the project “an awakening of the ghosts of Manshiya”, and used crayon to outline the old streets. This was an important project, but did not have any permanence in the city fabric.
There have been provisory exhibitions about Manshiya and the erasure of other Arabic villages, hosted in temporary spaces. But there is to my knowledge no permanent recognition.
There are foundations that collect testimonies from Manshiya; hence there is a lot of material such as movies and written testimonies. These movements try to enlighten this part of history, but are mainly web- based. In a way they are underground movements, and could benefit from being represented in a physical space.
The actual decision to erase the traces of Manshiya implies, in itself, the important role of a physical representation in the narrative of Tel Aviv’s history. The erasure is thorough and effective. There are many monuments in Tel Aviv, but they describe the history from a Hebrew perspective.
This is an example of how the winner of a battle, and the one who is in control of the physical space, also gains control of the cultural space.
And the one in control of the cultural space has a big advantage when it comes to dictating the narration of history.
“Hence, whatever is done or not done in the physical body of a city is also a kind of historiographical deed. The decision to demolish an old building, to build a new one, or to conserve an existing one, defines what is doomed to be forgotten, what is spared and what is worthy of
remembering.”
Sharon Rotbard, babelarchitectures.com
There is an ongoing discussion about “the right to the ruin”. A ruin sets in action a certain historical memory. It is also an important evidence of an historical action. But, once every physical trace is completely removed, it is also “out of mind” and could easily be denied. Removing buildings completely leaves no historical record whatsoever. The physical representation is an important way to reinforce memory.
2.3 Choice of site.
Many of the areas which once hosted the neighborhood of Manshiya are currently undeveloped. Some of them are parking lots; some of them are vast spaces. I aimed to choose an empty area, and focused my project on Hakovshim garden. The name is in Hebrew and can,
ironically enough, be translated into “The conquerors park”. The park is located close to the new business center. It used to host 12 blocks of residential buildings, but is now a non-place.
2.4 Morphology/ proposing a physical representation.
Once stating that my suggestion should be a physical representation, I continued into studies of morphology and symbolism. How to represent something of which nothing remains? How to embody something of which there are only abstract memories, testimonies and fragmentary documentation?
For example I evaluated the reconstruction, the abstraction, the excavation and what they meant in terms of symbolism.
I decided that, instead of another over ground symbol or monument, my proposal should be an underground structure. The subterranean implies that something is denied in the city plan, and lies hidden within. It also has a correlation to the Israeli “Tel” (mount), in which one historical layer lie underneath the other. When one civilization is conquered, another one is built on top. The previous civilization is covered with soil and sand.
The development started with a study of the block and the place, but ended up in an accentuation of the old street, the movement through a place, and the memory of movement. The ambition was to reconstruct that specific axis of movement through the area.
The final proposal is the result of a chain of methodical decisions, from the choice between suggesting a physical representation or not, to going underground or over ground, whether it should to be permanent or temporary, if it should deal with the block or the movement. If I had done a shift in one part of the chain of decisions, the result might have been another.
3. Proposal
The final suggestion is a sequence of exhibition halls, hidden under sand.
These rooms are connected to a hidden passage through the park of Hakovshim, right on the axis where the old street of Talha used to lie.
The subterranean street is an alternative path through the park and an aims to evoke the memory of the old street, of which there is no longer a trace. The visitor descends in one place and emerges in another. The park is left empty, with only a few shafts piercing through the ground, letting light down into the structure. From above ground level the structure presents itself as a series shafts emerging from underground, revealing what lies underneath. These vertical perforations all have different characters, and offer a view into the underground structure.
Picture illustrating the hall with perforated ceiling.
The proposed structure is covered in sand, and
wind will sometimes carry sand into the shafts and
perforations. This wishes to symbolize time. It is also
a correlation to the crusader ruins in Acre, Israel.,
which up until some years ago were hidden in sand.
PROCESS CHART
1. Define fundamental ques- tions.
- What role does architecture play in our memory?
- What is storytelling in architec- ture?
- Which is the responsibility of the architect in terms of histori- cal justice?
- Why the monument?
- Are physical remnants impor- tant? Why do we need the ruin, and what happens when it is removed?
- Which role has architecture played in times of warfare? Both as a tool to express power, and as a proof of historical events?
2. Research
- Historical examples.
- Internationally.
- Manshiya.
- Tel Aviv.
2.1 Recontruction - Tracing old maps.
- 3d modelling.
3. Embodiment
- Why a physical repre- sentation?
- What could such a physical representation be? - Do we need the monument?
- What is a monument?
4. Morphology - Abstraction?
- Reconstruction?
- Overground?
- Underground?
- The symbolism of those choices.
5. Program - Narrative.
- Representation.
- Movement.
Building
7. Reconnect/ re-evaluate
6. Plot
- Deciding on a space, in which to propose a physical representation.
- Analysis.
PROCESS
The project has developed through a series of questions, and the answer I suggested.
Hence, the final result is a product of a chain of smaller conclusions, and the answer was not formulated from the beginning. If there had been a shift somewhere in this chain, the result would have been different. However, after stating one of the suggestions, I continued into the others, and let each conlusion be the fundament for the next set of questions.
These questions have for example been:
- Who is the winner and the looser in writing our history, and how has
architecture been used in terms of narrating a series of events? In which way could it shape the way we understand our own history?
- Why is it possible that only a few people in Tel Aviv seem to know about Manshiya?
- Would a physical representation, or symbol, help illuminate this part of history?
- Is this physcial representation a commemorative, a monument, or just an informal place to be?
- Should it be underground or overground?
- Is it a reconstruction, or an abstraction?
- Should it be true to what was there? Does it follow the plan of the old buildings, which once were present in the area?
LITERATURE
- Overthrowing geography, Mark LeVine
- Black City, White City, Sharon Rotbard (translated parts).
- Violent Acts and Urban Space in Contemporary Tel Aviv: Revisioning Moments, Tali Hatuka, University of Texas Press, 1 maj 2010.
- The fragile monument, Thordis Arrhenius, 2003
- Advancing the struggle for urban justice to the assertion of substantive citizenship:
Challenging ethnocracy in Tel Aviv-Jaffa, Dena Quaddumi, Bartlett 2013.
- Jerusalem seminar 1994. Lecture by S. Anderson, Stanford.
- Invisible cities, Italo Calvino.
- Numerous articles, for example written in the newspaper Haaretz.
For more detailed references, please go to the last page of this document.
RECONSTRUCTION
Sketch with ink and graphite.
TEL AVIV, ISRAEL
In january 2013, I visited Israel in the company of my studio. Here I found the subject for my thesis.
ISRAEL
TEL AVIV
JERUSALEM
TEL AVIV TODAY 1:10 000 [A3]
MANSHIYA 1:10 000
Left: All of the illustrated area, except for 3
buildings, were erased up until the 1970´s.
MISSING MASS A representation of the mass which was erased from
the Tel Aviv area. Schematic 3D model.
1830
In the beginning of the century, a big immigration into Jaffa and surrounding areas took place. Many Egyptians, coming with Ibrahim Pasha, founded neighborhoods outside Jaffa. One of the Neighborhoods was Manshiya.TIMELINE
1881
Yemenite Jews were the first jews who settled outside of Jaffa, in the area of modern day Tel Aviv. Their neighbourhoods later became the Shabazi neighbourhood.1906
A group of members of Jaffas Jewish community, decided to form a society to purchase land outside Jaffa and construct homes. They bought 60 plots outside of Jaffa, in the place of todays Tel Aviv. They aimed for a “healthy atmosphere and hygienic conditions”. In order to circumvent the Turkish prohibition (1907) on Jewish land acquisition registered the land in namnes of ottoman Jews.Positioning of the land was strategic by political, cultural and geographic means. The aim was to control expansion of Jaffa, and cut it off to the north.
Pictures from: d1g.com, jewishvideo.com, the National Photo Collection, 1947.
1908
A big fight broke out between the Arab and Jewish youth in Jaffa. This foreshadowed the future violence.1909
The first stone on the fundament of Tel Aviv was laid. However, in the beginning the name of the neighborhood was Ahuzat Bayit.Most of the early construction in Tel Aviv was done by Arab workers, since they worked for a lower wage.
1910On 21 May 1910, the citizens of the newly founded city changed the name of their neighborhood from Ahuzat Bayit, to Tel Aviv. The name was taken from Hertzls book
“Altneuland”, which was an utopian romance about a man finding his new land. Tel means hill, and in the original meaning a “heap of ruins with layers from different civilizations”.
Aviv means spring, and carries the symbolism of rebirth and something new.The other Jewish neighborhoods merged with Tel Aviv, and together they were called
“New Jaffa”.
There was a problem with the security of the Tel Aviv, since Arabs attacked the neighborhoods.
1921
The Jewish immigration increased under the British administration.With this, the friction between Arabs and Jews in Palestine also grew significantly. The Jaffa riots on the 1st of May 1921, resulted in the deaths of 48 Arabs and 47 Jews. There were attacks between Tel Aviv and Jaffa municipality.
It all started with a demonstration by Jewish communists. After this, many Jews moved out of Jaffa, into Tel Aviv. Tel Aviv began to develop as a commercial center.
1917
The growth of Tel Aviv came to a halt in 1917, when the Ottoman authorities expelled the Jews of Jaffa and Tel Aviv.One year later, however, the World war ended. The Ottomans had now been defeated by the Brittish empire, and Palestine was under British control. The Jews were now able to return to their homes.
Pictures: Rudy Weissenstein December 1948, Elenita Borg.
1925
Patrick Geddes, the Scottish biologist,sociologist, philanthropist and pioneering town planner, drew up a master plan for Tel Aviv. This first plan for developing the northern part of the district was soon adopted and was named “The Geddes Plan”. It was an idealistic plan, which aimed to combine the best from urban and rural life.
1934
Tel Aviv gained municipal status.During the fifth Aliyah, the population grew in a high pace. When the Nazis came to power in Germany, many Jews fled to Tel Aviv. In 1937 the Jewish population of Tel Aviv had risen to 150,000. This is to compare to Jaffa’s mainly Arab residents of 69,000.
1936
The arab revolt 1936–39 (infitada) led to another conflict. Earlier, jews coming to Tel Aviv came via the port in Jaffa. After this revolt, they opened their own port; Tel Aviv Port. It was closed again in 1965.Lydda airport, later Ben Gurion airport, was opened.
1937
The Peel commission proposed a partition between Jewish and Arab territories;specifically by an “iron railing”. This became a physical border between Manshiya and Tel aviv.
1947
The 1947 UN Partition Plan for dividing Pales- tine into Jewish and Arab states, was established.According to this plan Tel Aviv would be a part of the new Jewish state.
Jaffa, in which half of the population were mus- lims, was to be a part of the Arab state. The Pales- tinian arabs did not agree with this decision. The tension grew between 1947-1948.
1948 On 14 May 1948, the Israeli Declaration of Independence was pronounced. The Executive Head of the World Zionist Organization, Ben Gurion, and the
chairman of the Jewish Agency for Palestine declared the establishment of a Jewish state.
The boundaries of Tel Aviv and Jaffa became a matter of discussion. Tel Aviv municipality wanted to incorporate the northern Jewish suburbs of Jaffa into Tel Aviv, and the Israeli goverment wanted a more complete unification with Jaffa.
This was complicated even internationally.
Tel Aviv was a part of the Jewish portion of the United Nations Partition Plan, but Jaffa belonged to the Palestinians according to the same resolution.
In the months between the United Nations’
decision of November 29, 1947, and the declaration of the State of Israel on May 15, 1948, a state of civil war was prevalent in Israel, in which Jewish paramilitary forces fought the civil population of Jaffa.
In the end of 1948, some of the northern Jewish suburbs had been annexed by Tel Aviv. However, attacks on Manshiya and other parts of the Palestinian areas had already started.
1949
On 18 May 1949 Manshiya and part of Jaffa’s central zone were fully added to the Jewish territory. This violated the UN Partition Plan, since they had now incorporated land areas which, according to the UN plan, belonged to the Palestinians.1970’s
The rest of Manshiya was erased, in favor for a business area, parks and parking lots.
NAHLE SHAKER/ LECTURE/ Autobiography of a city
ABU J BEHN REMEMBERS/ Abu J Behn shares his memories of the house in Manshiya in which he used to live/ Autobiography of a city
MEMORY OF MANSHIYA/ Zochrot association
VIDEO DOCUMENTATION/ TESTIMONIES/
Finding information on Manshiya was hard. Much is hidden, intentionally or not. But through some investigation, I have found a number of movies and recorded testimonies.
Pictures: Row one and two; Autobiography of a city, the jaffaproject.org (collected 2013-11-14), row three; zochrot.org.
Before 1948. In arabic, Manshiya means “place of growth”. Before 1948, this village was expanding from Jaffa, housing both Arabic and Jewish families.
After 1948. Pictures above show the process of demolition.
2013. The pictures above are photographed in february 2013, on my trip to Israel and Tel Aviv. The area now consist of recreational areas and parking lots. Once you know the history of the area, it is obvious that something is missing in these spaces. Unfortunately, many people are not aware of this part of Tel Avivs history. In a way, these empty plots, without any trace of the prior neighbourhood, makes the ignorance possible.
MANSHIYA, DOCUMENTATION OF THREE STAGES.
Pictures: Row one; babelarchitectures.blogspot.com, Zochrot association, d1g.com,. Row two; Nivschwartz.com, Ruby Weissenstein 1948, www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org, tripmondo.com, Walid Khalidi. Row three; Elenita Borg.
PREVIOUS PROJECTS
There is little material on the story of Manshiya or, for that matter, the erasure of other Arabic villages during the Nakba. There are some associations that try to enlighten this part of history. However, they appear to be more of underground movements, and are not physically present in Tel Aviv. Some projects, like the ones mentioned below, has been arranged in the city. But still, there is very little recognition. This is one of the reasons why I have suggested a permenent representation in Tel Aviv.
1. “WHAT ISN`T THERE” A temporary exhibition in Tel Aviv, hosted by Eitan Bronstein Aparicio. The subject was not only Manshiya, but it mentioned the erasure of several arabic villages during the Nakba. The exhibition was open from 15/08/12 to 22/09/12.
2. “AWAKING THE GHOSTS OF MANSHIYA” In 2007, artist Ronen Eidelman initiated his art project. The aim was to recognixe the alternative story of Tel Aviv. Ronen and his friends traced the streets of former Manshiya in the now empty lawns, and marked them with their old arabic names. Even this project was temporary. The drawn lines dissapeared once it rained. However, the project was very appreciated by the people of Tel Aviv, and it raised an interest.
Pictures: Row one; Zochrot.org, row two; roneneidelman.com,.
WHAT IS LEFT
Today, only three buildings from the Manshiya neighbourhood remain.
1. Hassan Bek mosque, which is in a similar condition
today as it was before 1948. 2. The train station, which after 1948 was a ruin, but has
undergone renovation. 3. Etzel museum. This building was once a house of an
arabic family, later a ruin occupied by immigrants, and now a museum. Ironically enough, it is not a museum explaining the history of Manshiya, but it is a museum hosting the history of Irgun, the terrorist organization that drew inhabitants out of Manshiya.
3. Etzel house, before it was renovated and turned into a museum.
The train station, in bad condition after 1948.
“They told me that the city is white. Do you see white? I don’t see any white.”
- Jean Nouvel standing on a Tel Aviv rooftop, looking at Tel Aviv for the first time in his life, November 1995.
“The city must completely disappear from the surface of the earth /.../No stone can remain standing. Every building must be razed to its foundation.”
—SS chief Heinrich Himmler, October 17, SS officers’ conference.
“History is written by the victors, for the victors, and always according to the victors history.”
- Sharon Rotbard, White City, Black City.
“... Hence, whatever is done or not done in the physical body of a city is also a kind of historiographical deed. The
decision to demolish an old building, to build a new one, or to conserve an existing one, defines what is doomed
to be forgotten, what is spared and what is worthy of remembering.”
- Sharon Rotbard, babelarchitectures.com
“Those who control the physical space often control the cultural space, and they are never those who have lost the battle over history.”
- Sharon Rotbard, White City, Black City.
“The voices and sounds of war. Death, street renovation, and everyday life are all mixed together in one continuous violent and clashing negotiation that modifies and designs our environment.
And the architects? They make plans. And daily life? A non-stop negotiation of construction and destruction”
-Tali Hatuka, describing the morning of the suicide bombing at the dolphinarium in Tel Aviv, 2001.
Violent acts and urban space in contemporary Tel Aviv: revisioning moments.
Pictures: wikipedia.org, touristisrael.com, picture received from Prof. Amnon Bar Or, Elenita Borg, Nivschwartz.com.
METHAPHORS/ SYMBOLS FOUND IN ISRAEL
They project has taken its inspiration from several places, visited on my trip to Israel in 2013.
I have suggested a series of exhibition halls, hidden in sand. The sand has worked as a symbol in two ways: first as a metaphor for time.
Second: as something with preservative qualities, which documents a movement or an action in the shape of a trace or a track.
My trip to Israel has influenced the project in terms of symbolism. We visited many historically important and interesting sites, such as the Crusader ruins in Acre, and Jerusalem. To me, Israel was a place of multiple historical and political layers.
THE POST-NAKBA LANDSCAPE
Many Arabic villages were erased during the Nakba. Only empty landscapes are left.
THE BORDER/ CONTESTING SPACES
Border to Syria. Israel is a place of borders. HIDDEN IN SAND, Ruins in Acre.
Up until some years ago, parts of the crusader ruins in Acre were hidden in a layer of sand. When the conquerors built a new civilization, they covered the previous structure with sand. Then they were able to build on top of it.
THE RUIN , Hadrianus palace.
THE UNDERGROUND PASSAGE Crusader ruins, Acre.
THE SAND ROAD
The sand road is built next to many of the borders. The intention is to record the steps of anyone crossing the fence.
Once someone has passed the boundary, an expert can analyze the footprint.
The intrudor can be identified by, for example, age and weight.
Memory is closely connected to a place, as shown for example in the recent study
“Neural Activity in Human Hippocampal Formation Reveals the Spatial Context of Retrieved Memories”. [Jonathan F. Miller
, Irina Mader et al.] Memory is sometimes said to be constructed as a series of
rooms, all connected to each other. I decided to study the structure of the old Manshiya grid.
Memory is also closely connected to a specific movement [memory of movement] This is in a way an incarnation of memory. It might be a way to transform a memory into something physical.
Pictures: Thefunambulist.com, Elenita Borg,.
RUIN MASS
Right, air view from 1949. The faded, white areas illutrate ruin masses. The area marked with a square is now Hakovshim garden, and empty park, which I have chosen as a plot for my project.
Area of Hakovshim garden.
USING THE ORIGINAL GRID
As a part of the process, I evaluated the possibility to reconstruct, or reuse, the old grid of Manshiya. Some of the old volumes would be new rooms, some of the old buildings would be shafts and voids.
I defined a certain set of rules, and let the old volumes define the new spatial relations. To some extent, the actual perimeter of the old wall seemed important. The vision of being able to put your hand out and touch a wall that once existed on exactly the same place, was an inspiration.
TRACING
The first assigment was to trace the old maps.
REDEFINING
The perimeter of some of the columes were translated into wall. I used a wall thickness of 800 mm, and followed the grid by aligning the wall either to the inside or the outside of the old lines.
A SHAFT, A ROOM
Some of the spatialities became shaft, and som became rooms with different characters.
Pictures:Maps received from Prof. Amnon Bar Or.
Once I decided to propose a physical representation, I began modelling different alternatives, as a form study. For example, I evaluated the concept of a reconstruction, and abstraction, or an excavation. I investigated what these strategies would mean in terms of symbolism.
[Empty space] Nothing is left of Manshiya. How to
remind of something that is not there? Reconstruction. Abstraction.
An excavated structure. A shape that reveals itself in the overground space. Shafts opening up the structure.
A definition of the negative (positive) space.
Removing the missing mass again, to illustrate the erasure. Re-shaping the negative (positive) space.
MORPHOLOGY/ IN SEARCH FOR A SHAPE OF REPRESENTATION
The process also included studies of existing memorials.
Subterrainean structure following the footprint.
Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, Peter
Eisenman. The monolith. National September 11 Memorial, Daniel
Liebeskind, Michael Arad.
Bebelplatz, Berlin.
Zooming out, and looking at the relation between the
previous blocks. Identification of a movement that once was there. (Evoking the
memory of this lost movement through a space.)
?
Hakovshim garden of today. There is no trace of the old street.
Before 1948, the park hosted numerous blocks. Talha street passed through the area.
I have suggested a reconstruction of the axis, by creating an alternative passage through the park. The underground street connects the northern and southern parts of the park, right on the spots where Talha used to connect.
A series of rooms are connected to passage, and the structure is covered in sand. The elevation of the
subterrainean street changes from -4 to -6 meters, measured from entrance level.
A STRUCTURE COVERED WITH SAND
The sand is frequently present in Israel. The myth says that Tel Aviv rose out of the dunes of sand. Sand is used in connection to the borders; as trail roads in which it is possible to track the steps of trespassers.
It is also a symbol of time.
The proposed subterrainean structure is covered in a layer of sand, illustrating that something is hidden underneath. When people or animals move through the park, their steps are preserved as prints in the grain. These prints are records of a specific motion or a specific moment in time.
Pictures:shutterstock.com, dogsandpeople.it.
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Site plan, 1:1000 (A3)
The old map of Manshiya. The drawing above illustrates the plan of the area before 1948. All buildings in this plan, except for Hassan Beque mosque in the south-west corner, are today erased.
The park of Hakovshim with surroundings at present time. Areas marked
with P are parkings. The areas that today host parkings are of a high value, mainly because of
their central location. My prognosis is that these areas will be exploited in the close future. I have used a scenario in which most of these plots are developed.
A view with the map of Manshiya overlapping the park. I have regognized the lost axis of the old Talha street, and recreated the movement as an alternative passage through the park.
Volumes, emerging from underground. I have used the grid of the old map. Some of the erased volumes are now represented as shafts or volumes, piercing through the sand. They affect the movement through the park, and create views down into the underground structure.
p p
p
p p
Short section through exhibition hall with dome, 1:200 (A3).
HAKOVSHIM GARDEN
The name “hakovshim” means “conqueror”
in Hebrew. Ironically enough, the name speaks of the army that drew citizens out of Manshiya.
Hakovshim garden lies north of the business center. It touches the border that, prior to 1948, divided Tel Aviv into a northern Hebrew part and a southern Arabic part. I have chosen this site partly because of its obvious emptiness. Walking through the garden today, you would not suspect that it used to host a whole set of blocks. The though of something being hidden in another historical layer was inspiring.
The area around the park is used as parking. Streets are used as bus parkings.
The landscape is dried out, and there are already sandy areas in the park.
View to the south. The business center is visible in the skyline.
Skala 1:400.
5 10 20 50
Section, 1:400 (A3). Lost axis of movement. The section is a cut through the
old street of Talha. It is an illutsration of the the building as an alternative,
subterrainean passage through the park, on the spot where the old street used to be.
Skala 1:400.
5 10 20 50
Plan, 1:400 (A3).
Above: Plan diagram, showing the different heights.
Schematic plan, showing the position of shafts.
-4 -6
-6
-6 -6
-7
-7
-9 -5
-8 -5
-5
Plan 1:400.
Once you enter the passage, you move from different levels. As you move further into the structure , the rooms are deeper and shaft become higher.
Some of the rooms, directly connected to the passage, are exhibition halls which easily can be transformed into movie rooms. When you move throught the underground street, you can hear the sounds of testimonines or documentaries playing. It is a place to pause for a moment, while moving through the park.
The structure is following the grid of the old city. Some of the houses are now shafts and offer views to the sky. They open up as yards in different sizes, offering pauses in the movement through the underground plan.
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